Life is more than 400 words on A7

There's a person in our newsroom most readers don't even know about, yet she is responsible for some of the most well-read items in The Daily Record.

Most people call her "the obit lady."

She sits quietly in the newsroom, fielding phone calls from funeral directors and family members from all over the place. Sometimes, things run pretty smoothly. She's on a very cordial first-name basis with every funeral home staff in about three counties and they know exactly what they need to do to make sure an obituary is in on deadline, proofed and paid for.

Other days, "the obit lady" asks more questions than the top reporter on the news staff: Is there a local connection? How do you want to say this or say that in print? What are the payment arrangements? Is that the photo the family feels comfortable using?

You get the idea.

Our obit lady often gets the brunt of a family crisis and more often a person dealing with maybe the hardest, saddest life event he or she has ever experienced.

After all, what do you say when someone has died? How to you sum up a long life, well-lived, in five or so paragraphs? Worse yet, how do you offer in about 400 words, the meaning of a life cut short or one barely begun?

I think about that sometimes, especially because "the obit lady" is my desk mate in the newsroom and a new schedule puts me on that desk every Sunday now.

How do you want your obituary to read?

Most begin with name, age, date and time and place of death, then continue on with a basic biography: birthdate, place of birth, parents. And then there might be schooling, a job, a church or club affiliation, followed by survivors. It all gets wrapped up with calling hours, services, burial and maybe a place where memorial contributions can be sent.

It may take 5 inches of newsprint. It may take 30 inches. But in the end (literally speaking), everyone's obituary follows pretty much the same formula.

And that's that. The clock strikes 6 p.m., the deadline is past and the file empties out for the next round.

In a way, it's a metaphor, I suppose, about how time marches on.

Gee, that's kind of dark. I didn't really mean it to sound like that. But hey, I work in a deadline business. What's front page news on Monday will be a footnote in a very short time.

What I'm saying is this: Your life is way more than a summary on page A7 or where ever the news hole falls on a given day. Think of your life more like a book, where every page represents one day.

Some people don't get many pages. Others get volumes. The length doesn't matter; it's the content that matters.

Any decent editor will tell you there's something to be said for an economy of words.

Don't waste words.

Don't waste days.

Choose carefully what you do with your days, so in the end, your book will be a really good read.

A life is more than the five paragraphs a newspaper affords it. Make yours front-page news.

Reporter Tami Mosser can be reached at 330-287-1655 or tmosser@the-daily-record.com. She is @tamimosser on Twitter.